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Old 05-19-2015, 10:08 PM   #26
Jazuela
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Join Date: Apr 2002
Location: New England
Posts: 849
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Re: Taking another look at some MUDs

You've answered your own question in part already: its time has come and gone, for people to pay for text.

But a HUGE part of it - is that MOST of the MUDs out there use code made by others and the licensing requires the game to not gain any revenue. DIKU and LPMud and CircleMUD all require that the game owner NOT charge players.

So the reason they can't pay, is because they're not allowed to pay. Beyond the server costs (which they can recoup by charging for fan-products like game logo coffee mugs or mousepads, for example), the coders and staff are not *allowed* to get paid from game revenue. Now, if the head admin is wealthy and wants to pay his head coder out of pocket, that's fine. As long as the players don't have to foot the bill.

This is true for -most- text games out there, because -most- text games out there are some variation of Diku, Circle, or LPMud. There are other main game codes out there that are required to be strictly hobbyist use only (meaning - you can't charge your players, and the staff can't be paid from any game revenue). But those are the big three, and they're pretty big.
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